


who's gonna drive you home tonight

by FakePlastikTrees



Category: The Bold Type
Genre: F/F, Post 2x09
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-07
Updated: 2018-08-07
Packaged: 2019-06-23 05:44:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15599577
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FakePlastikTrees/pseuds/FakePlastikTrees
Summary: Set post 2x09. Jacqueline goes for a drive, runs into an unexpected someone.





	who's gonna drive you home tonight

**Author's Note:**

> Jacqueline's POV is way overdue.

Jacqueline’s never been one to crave comfort from someone else. Not in the needy, I-need-you-to-make-it-all-better-because-I-can’t-handle-it way. Not even with her husband, who is the sweetest man and he would do it in a second.

 

That’s not what she does.

 

Jacqueline Carlyle is the fixer. She fixes other people’s problems, and her own. She doesn’t crave validation, she doesn’t need it. And if she needed it, she _had_ it. Has it. At home. Except she can’t get herself to go there.

 

The thought of going home and seeing her children, the silence of her home past bedtime and her husband’s sweet smile, that warm, understanding look on his face, the unadulterated support--even the dog, she can’t bask in all that warmth when she feels this low.

 

So, she goes for a ride, drives around until finds herself in some newly developed Brooklyn neighborhood.

 

By the third ironically named bar, she shakes her head and suddenly misses the days when Brooklyn was dangerous.

 

Pausing at a red light, she rests her head on the backrest and sees herself in the twenty-somethings crossing the street for a second. She puts herself back at that age and for an instant, the thrill of invincibility returns. All too soon, she feels it slip away and she’s eerily aware of her own mortality. Of her--age.

 

She groans to herself, hating herself for such an unimaginative crisis to have. How cliche this all is. She always told herself she’d never let anything or any person define her, and here she is, letting a job do exactly that.

 

Just when she’s about to fall off the commiserating edge of self-pity, a familiar someone steps off the curb to cross the road. Jacqueline freezes suddenly, feeling strangely like she’s 15 years old again, caught skipping school by her dad. And why should she? She’s an adult, she’s allowed to be away from home without a specific reason to be.

 

She starts to duck and then chastises herself for being so ridiculous. What would Jane Sloan care if she happened to lie to her husband about where she was? What are the chances she’ll even see--well, now she’s seen her.

 

Jane stops in the middle of the crossway, spots Jacqueline and waves, saying something Jacqueline can’t quite hear so she lowers the window and sticks her head out.

 

“Hi, Jane.”

 

“Hi! What are you doing here?” She’s holding a brown paper bag and the red light can’t possibly last this long.

 

“Just going for a drive.”

 

“Oh, me too. A walk,” Jane replies, eyeing the blinking walking signal telling her she has 5 seconds to cross. “Uh, where are you headed?”

 

“Just--” Cars begin to honk and Jacqueline laughs when Jane has the nerve to glare at the impatient drivers.

 

“Oh, my god, are you in a hurry!” She yells.

 

“Yeah, kinda!” A disembodied voice shouts back and suddenly Jane is in a shouting match in the middle of the street and something tells Jacqueline this isn’t a normal occurrence.

 

The light has changed and people are beginning to get angry, though Jane doesn’t seem anywhere near done yelling.

 

“It’s called a crossway, you animal!”

 

Jacqueline puts the car in ‘park’ unclasps her seatbelt and climbs out, hurrying over to step between Jane and her view of her adversary. The girl’s eyes are wild and she looks dead set on winning this match.

 

“Jane,” Jacqueline says her name a few times before snapping her fingers in her face, “Hey!”

 

Jane blinks, seemingly dazed, lost in some projected feeling. Jacqueline knows what this is because this is what she is at the moment, so she grabs her by the arm and pulls her along.

 

“Get in the car. I know you’re fully convinced you want to murder that man, but I promise you it won’t make it go away. Come on.”

 

Jane doesn’t fight her. She climbs in right alongside Jacqueline and they drive in silence for twenty or thirty minutes. The entirety of Joni Mitchell’s _Blue_ plays as they turn onto some road that appears to be leaving the city.

 

“Okay with you if I keep driving?” Jacqueline asks between Joni and The New Pornographers. “Is there somewhere you want me to take you?”

 

Jane shakes her head. “No. let’s go wherever.” Moments later, when there’s only a stretch of road ahead, she says, “I’m sorry about that. I didn’t--want you to see that.”

 

“Please don’t apologize.”

 

Jane is staring. Jacqueline can feel those eyes burning into the side of her face and it’s beginning to make her feel self conscious.

 

“Jane,” she says with an uneasy chuckle. “What? What is it?”

 

“Something’s wrong.”

 

“What?”

 

“You don’t know where you’re driving and you didn’t seem to think it strange to just stick me in your car. You were avoiding--something.”

 

“What--are you high?”

 

Jane’s eyes become small as she nods. “Yes.”

 

Jacqueline laughs and shakes her head. “I should have known. I didn’t take you as the stoner type.”

 

“Usually just on occasion. I actually hadn’t in a while. I was feeling a little old for my age, so I thought, fuck it.”

 

“Old for your age, huh?” Jacqueline asks and exits onto a different street, stopping near a dark, empty Park. “How’s that?”

 

Jane sighs beside her and scoots down in her seat as Jacqueline kills the engine and undoes her seatbelt. It’s a few seconds before Janes starts talking, about her day, about her reproductive issues and her doubts about having children, doubts about her relationship, and she’s absolutely right. That is far too much for someone her age to deal with. Surprisingly, worrying about that makes Jacqueline forget about her own problems.

 

Reaching over the console, she places her hand over Jane’s on her lap and gives it a gentle squeeze. “I’m really, so sorry you have to go through this, Jane.”

 

Jane turns her hand over and Jacqueline thinks perhaps this is unprofessional, perhaps, holding her subordinate’s hand late at night in her car is not the wisest of decisions, but Jane looks up, welled up and looking at her like she’s so thankful for the attention, so Jacqueline pushes the intrusive thoughts away.

 

“This looks painfully familiar,” Jane says, signaling between them and laughing as she pulls her hand away and uses it to cover her mouth. “I should really get a therapist, or start paying you.”

 

“Well, considering I may be out of a job soon, it’s something to consider.”

 

She shouldn’t have said that. She realizes that. She knows it the moment Jane’s brow furrows deeply with worry and turns her body toward Jacqueline.

 

“What?”

 

“Nothing,” Jacqueline tries, shaking her head, “Doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t have said that.”

 

“Is it the article? Jacqueline, you know that’s bullshit, right?”

 

Jacqueline tries to not look taken aback but she’s never heard Jane curse before and it feels like slowly chipping at the wall she keeps between her and her employees--Jane has been picking at the weak spots since they met.

 

This time Jane takes Jacqueline’s hand in both her own. “You know no one else can run Scarlet like you.”

 

“You know, usually, I’m confident about that but lately--well, let’s just say you’re not the only one feeling too old for their age.”

 

“Stop it.”

 

“It’s not a personal thing, not really, it’s--you know as well as I do that the fashion industry is all about youth and the sell-by date is different.”

 

“You’re not at your sell-by date!”

 

“Fifty is not exactly a selling point.”

 

“Oh come on, I’d still--”

 

Jane stops, blushes and Jacqueline fights the urge to react too obviously.

 

“Ah,” she says and closes her eyes. “I’m too high for this, I’m going to stop talking.”

 

“What were you going to say?” Jacqueline asks, slowly pulling her hand from Jane’s grasp to give her some room. Her heart is beating faster, anticipating--what? What can she possibly expect to hear? And why does she care so much?

 

“Probably something I shouldn’t.”

 

Jacqueline grips the steering wheel and the leather protests under the strain. She really needs to stop this—whatever it is. What is she doing with this girl in her car? What was she thinking?

 

Well, she isn’t thinking. She’s about to offer calling Jane a cab, when Jane beats her to the punch.

 

“Fifty is the new 30, you know.”

 

Jacqueline’s face contorts into something she does not want to imagine and she laughs, her hands falling off the steering wheel to rest idly on her lap. She exclaims, “What!”

 

She watches Jane’s features light up as if by making Jacqueline laugh, she’s won some sort of contest.

 

That’s not good. And that Jacqueline likes it is even worse. She really should have just dropped her at the nearest corner and driven back home. To her husband. Who would know exactly what to say. The perfect thing to say.

 

What is wrong with her that she is suddenly repulsed by ‘perfect’?

 

“Come on!” Jane says, letting her head fall back, clutching her paper bag closer. “Half of Scarlet wants to be you and the other half wants to be with you.”

 

“To which half do you correspond?” _Bad idea_.

 

“Um,” Jane blushes, laughs, and Jacqueline can smell the lawsuit.

 

Really what is _wrong_ with her?

 

“You don’t have to answer that.”

 

“I might be somewhere in the middle.”

 

Now it’s Jacqueline’s turn to blush. Luckily, it’s dark and Jane is still looking out at the park.

 

“That’s sweet of you, Jane.”

 

“I’m not trying to be sweet. I’m just—you asked.”

 

“Let’s pretend I didn’t.” Jacqueline sighs. “It’s been a long day.”

 

“Tell me about it.”

 

“What’s in your little bag there?”

 

“Oh,” Jane says, pulling the bag just enough to reveal a bottle of cheap vodka. “I uh, have been feeling a little weighed down by adult decisions I’m nowhere near ready to make, so I’ve spent the entire day doing stupid, irresponsible things. I can now add ‘hitting on my boss and risking getting fired’ to the list, so I might just be done for the night.”

 

“No more room on that list, huh?”

 

This time, Jacqueline doesn’t pretend to be surprised by what comes out of her mouth. Now she knows what she was doing lying about where she was going, and now she knows why she was driving aimlessly. Turns out there was an aim all along.

 

Jane looks surprised for a fraction of a second before she turns her body toward Jacqueline again, looks her up and down and then says, “Maybe there’s room for one more thing.”

 

This whole thing is a bad idea. It’s something that should only follow at least half of that bottle Jane has put in the backseat for safekeeping. It shouldn't be happening it all, but if it must, she should at least be drunk so she can blame it on that afterwards. But she’s sober as a nun and so is Jane, despite the lingering effects of whatever it was she was smoking before Jacqueline found her.

 

“This is a terrible idea,” Jacqueline mumbles against Jane’s mouth as she makes quick work of undoing her pants and slipping her her hand inside them. As Jacqueline lifts her hips to chase very agile fingers, she tries to think back on any comments Jane might have made in the past that could have clued her in that she was good at this.

 

“You’ve dodged sniper fire in Panama,” Jane replies, nipping at Jacqueline’s earlobe, “You can handle a little post-coital awkwardness.”

 

Jacqueline’s mind goes foggy after that, and so do the windows the warmer the car gets. Somewhere between Jane’s hands and Jane’s tongue in her mouth, Jacqueline forgets to listen to her rational brain and instead gives into oblivion.

 

If only for a few minutes, she’ll pretend this is fine. Whatever comes after she’ll deal with when she gets some of her confidence back. Hearing Jane moan when she touches her seems to get Jacqueline well on her way there. She decides that maybe this wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

 


End file.
